The Ghana National
Chamber of Commerce and Industry, in collaboration with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) on Tuesday, 10th April, 2018, organized the Chamber Executive Business Meeting at Kempinski Hotel Gold Coast City.
The event, which was under the theme: Alternative Form of Financing for SME’s in Ghana, was chaired by the President of the Ghana National Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Nana Dr. Appiagyei Dankawoso I, who indicated in his opening remarks that the event comes at an opportune time when there have been several calls for increased access to long term funds and reduction in interest rate.
He said access to cheap credit has supported the growth and development of businesses across the world and has facilitated the attainment of economic, technological, industrial and infrastructural development in developed countries.
He stated that available data from Trading Economics shows that within the G20, Central Banks or monetary authorities in countries such as Germany, France, Netherlands, Italy, and Spain provide credit at zero cost to commercial banks. Adding that, Japan and Switzerland even go further to provide credit at -0.10% and -0.75% respectively.
He made mention of similar situation in some African countries that provide credit at single digit rate like Comoros (1.16%) Morocco (2.25%) Cameroon (2.95%) Mauritius (3.5%) Ivory Coast (4.5%) Botswana (5.0%) and Rwanda (5.5%).
In comparison to other countries, the President said Ghana’s monetary policy rate (18.0%) is the second-joint position with Angola and Mozambique in Africa and sixth-joint position with Angola, Iran, and Mozambique in the world. He also said Ghana is noted with the highest banking lending rate (35.5%) in Africa and second to Brazil (57.72%) in the world.
Nana Dr. Appiagyei Dankawoso said with the aforementioned statistics, SME’s in Ghana are constrained in accessing cheap credit and there is the need to continue exploring alternative form of financing for SME’s in Ghana.
He stated that the event was aimed at strengthening capital markets in Ghana by expanding the options available to SME’s in accessing finance in the face of high interest rate regime.
The Ghana Stock Exchange took participants through the process and benefits of listing of securities on the Ghana Stock Exchange, Ghana Alternative Market (GAX), and Ghana Fixed Income Market (GFIM).
Dr. Victor Antwi, the acting Chief of Party, USAID Financing Ghanaian Agriculture Project, elaborated on what the USAID FinGAP is doing to support agriculture project to enhance Ghana’s food security. The programme is expected to be replicated in Kumasi and Takoradi.